About me

This blogname was derived from the novel The Secret Life Of Saeed The Pessoptimist by the Palestinian Israeli Emile Habiby: absurdism as weapon against the (ir)realities of daily life in Palestine/Israel. (The subtitle is from a book by Dutch author Renate Rubinstein. It could as well be my motto).
My real name is Martin (Maarten Jan) Hijmans. I've been covering the ME since 1977 and have been a correspondent in Cairo. I started my 'Abu Pessoptimist' blog in January 2009 out of anger during the onslaught in Gaza. The other one, The Pessoptmist, is meant to be a sister version in English. (En voor de Nederlandstaligen: ik wilde in november 2009 een tweede blog in het Engels beginnen en ontdekte te laat dat als je één account hebt, een profiel dan meteen ook voor allebei de blogs geldt. Vandaar dat het nu ineens in het Engels is... So sorry.)

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

Jerusalem municipality demolishes house

Bulldozers of the Israeli Municipality of Jerusalem Wednesday demolished a Palestinian-owned under construction house in
Wadi Qadoom neighborhood in the East Jerusalem town of Silwan, under the pretext there was no licence for the building.

Wadi Hilweh
Information Center reported that Israeli police forces, accompanied with
bulldozers, and a municipal staff, stormed the town of Silwan in
the pre-dawn hours, sealed off Wadi Qadoom and surrounding areas,
before proceeding to demolish the 300-square-meters house, which was built only
three months ago and belonged to local Samer Nassar.

The Nassar family
said that the demolition took place without any prior notice, noting that the
building costs amounted to 180 thousand Israeli Shekels (over 35 thousand
Dollars).

According to B’Tselem,
the Israeli information center for human rights in the occupied
territories, from 2004 until 31 Aug. 2015, Israel demolished at least 579
Palestinian residential units in the East Jerusalem area, causing 2,133 people
– including at least 1,158 minors – to lose their homes.